Go Sadness
by Lila2
Summary: Quinn might think that she’s going at it alone but there’s always someone by her side.
1. Part I

**Title: **"Go Sadness"

**Author: **Lila

**Rating:** PG-13

**Character/Pairing:** Quinn (with special appearances from Rachel, Amy Puckerman, and the Fathers Berry)

**Spoiler: **"Sectionals"

**Length: **Part I of III

**Summary: **Quinn might think that she's going at it alone but there's always someone by her side

**Disclaimer: **Not mine, just borrowing them for a few paragraphs

**Author's Note:** Yes, yes, I still have that Finn/Finchel piece in mind and it will happen, but I wanted to do this first because "Sectionals" closed some doors but opened others and I can't wait until April to see if my dream of Rachel/Quinn as roommates is canon. So I did it on my own and then some. Also, about the title of this fic: I've been a big fan of Shout Out Louds for a long time but this was never a song I really paid attention to until it was used on "The O.C." in a season three scene of Seth and Summer putting together their college applications. It's a very sweet, simple song that always makes me think about growing up and letting go of childhood and moving into adulthood, and it seemed the perfect fit for the journey Quinn undergoes in this fic. If you've made it this far, I hope you'll keep reading the actual fic. Title courtesy of Shout Out Louds. Enjoy.

* * *

**Part I: **_**Family**_

---

It's only when she's standing at the drop off lane, shivering with bare legs and a thin coat in the Ohio winter, that she realizes she has nowhere to go.

Finn is gone, gone from school and gone from Glee and gone from her life.

It's an hour later and her cheeks still sting from the slap of his words: _"I'm done with you." _Everyone else has left her behind; she can't blame the one person who rightly deserved to walk out of her life for leaving too.

There's a noise beside her and for a moment she thinks it might be Puck, because she pushed him away like she has for so many weeks, but he's never been very good at following her orders. She waits for the weight of his letter jacket to drape over her shoulders, protect her from the wind the way her arms cradle the bump of their baby.

A hand rests on her shoulder, but it's smaller and probably softer and it doesn't make her feel safe. It mostly makes her lunch rise to her throat and it has more to do with the mess she's made of her life and less to do with the morning sickness that's never quite gone away. "Quinn, what are you doing out here? You must be freezing."

She grips her coat so tightly her knuckles ache rather than ram her fist between Rachel's eyes. She's still not angry with her, but she's here and that's really all the excuse she needs. She doesn't do it though. She's caused too much pain already for Rachel's face to become collateral damage. "Finn's mom always picks us up here after school," she says. "I…I didn't know where else to go."

"Quinn, do you have a place to stay?" Rachel asks and she keeps gripping her coat because every embarrassing secret she's ever had has already been revealed to Rachel's advantage and she knows she has nothing left to lose but it still hurts to watch the last dregs of her pride go down the tubes.

"No," she says and it comes out watery and a bit strangled and she knows she has no right to cry because she made this mess all by herself, but that doesn't make it any less scary. She's sixteen and pregnant and homeless. In the movies she and her sister used to watch on Lifetime there was always a happy ending, but this is real life. She remembers the agony in Finn's eyes and watching Puck's heart break; real life isn't wrapped up with a pretty bow.

"Well then," Rachel says and slides her hand down her arm to lock on her elbow. "You're going to stay with me."

She's not sure how to react. Does she laugh? Does she cry? Does she rub her eyes and make sure she's not trapped in a nightmare? Does she pinch herself, to make sure she's real and not stuck in bizarro land? She contemplates all these reactions, because she's technically not mad at Rachel but it still doesn't mean she isn't kind of tempted to punch her in the face just for being the kind of person she couldn't be.

Her words to Puck push to the forefront of her mind, because she meant what she said. She's hurt enough people; she's not going to drag anyone down with her any longer. Except she's still sixteen and pregnant and homeless. She has a baby to protect. She doesn't have another choice.

"Okay," she says and steps a little closer to Rachel, because her coat is warmer and the sky is getting darker and the wind is picking up. "But just until I find a real place to stay."

A car pulls up and honks three times and Rachel drops her arm to wave and she stands back awkwardly while Rachel pokes her head through an open window and gestures in her direction. "Come on in," Rachel says with a laugh and opens the passenger door and the car is so warm that she practically runs into the backseat.

"Hi Quinn," one of Rachel's dads says to her. He has dark hair that's just going gray at the temples and she can't see much of Rachel in him but his eyes are bright and his smile is huge and it starts to make more sense. "I hear you'll be staying with us for a little while."

She smiles, the way her mother taught her, and buckles her seatbelt. "Thank you so much. I really appreciate your hospitality while I figure things out."

Rachel's dad smiles again in way that she knows is real and not a mask like her own, and puts the car into drive. "Any friend of Rachel's is a friend of ours."

She tries to meet Rachel's eyes in the rearview mirror during the trip, but she makes a big deal of looking out the window and Quinn is mostly lost with her own thoughts.

She leans back against the headrest and cradles her baby with one hand, the other fingering the thin chain of the cross she still wears around her neck. Her pastor has always preached the consequence of sin and she knows she's violated every commandment ten times over.

She and Rachel are teammates and sometime acquaintances but friendship has never been on the table. Yet, here she is, listening to show tunes in the backseat of Rachel's father's car and about to move in with her.

She wonders if her god is laughing at her because she knows something of atonement but she thinks this is more like hell on earth.

~ *~

Rachel's other dad is older and darker and tells her his name is John. "It's a good thing I make the big bucks in this house," he says while she helps him set the table. "Only one of us could be an artist and there's already a composer name John Barry."

"He wrote the James Bond theme," Rachel adds as she puts a basket of bread on the table.

Her other father, David, starts talking about the genius of "Dr. No" as he adds a casserole dish of lasagna and a bowl of broccoli, and Rachel and John both jump into the conversation; none of them seem to notice how much they talk over each other. There's a smear of red paint on the back of David's hand and a dash of blue by his temple and John keeps making these huge gestures to prove a point and how Rachel became Rachel is so obvious that Quinn can't help the smile that curves her lips.

"Well I'll be," John says and the other two shut up long enough to turn their eyes to her. "I think that's the first smile we've seen out of you since you stepped through the door."

She feels her cheeks flush but her smile only widens and then a laugh bubbles out of her belly. "How do you ever have a conversation when you're all talking at once?"

David shrugs and drops an arm over his daughter's shoulders. "It's a gift. Stick around long enough and you'll master the skill too."

Her cheeks flush again but it has nothing to do with being put on the spot and everything to do with being wanted.

~ * ~

They don't say grace before they eat.

She didn't expect it at Finn's, because cooking in the Hudson household meant heating up leftovers and shoveling them down before his mom left for the night shift, but the Berrys are a family. Somehow, she expected more.

They don't say grace but they also don't stop talking the entire meal. They talk about the weather and they talk about politics and they talk about what's on TV and they laugh and joke, but they mostly talk about their days. She learns that John is a lawyer and David is an artist and Rachel…well she thinks she knows more about Rachel than both of them combined.

She thinks back to meals from her childhood, the clink of the ice in tumblers and the clipped conversations about church and Rush and whatever the Democrats were blowing out their asses, but she doesn't remember talking about Cheerios or her 4.0 or even Glee. She doesn't remember sharing anything about herself with the people closest to her in the world.

She doesn't say much during dinner, although she does compliment the cooks because the food is delicious; mostly, she tunes out the conversation and hopes it won't focus on her. She likes these people too much to let them in on who she really is.

"Quinn, how was your day?" David breaks through her thoughts and her fork stills on her plate. If she weren't living with Rachel, this might be her worst nightmare coming true because she likes these people who've fed her without a second thought, and she's afraid they might toss her out on the doorstep like her parents if they learn just how ugly she is inside.

"It was…" she starts but Rachel cuts in and steals the attention away; for once, she doesn't think she minds.

"It was really hard, Daddy. We have Sectionals coming up and practice was insane. Did I tell you about Mercedes' solo?"

She listens carefully as Rachel goes on about the solo showdown, waiting for the part about her Maury Povich moment to become dinner table conversation, but Rachel never brings it up.

Her cheeks feel warm again and she knows it has nothing to do with the temperature of the food. Growing up, her mother always insisted on thanking god for their food and their health and their lives, and she always followed through because that's what a good Christian girl was supposed to do. All her life, she believed god was on her side, but when she needs him most, when she's pregnant and scared and alone, he's nowhere to be found. Instead, she's eating dinner with heathens who'd rather talk about "Ragtime" failing on Broadway than the decoration committee for the Chastity Ball.

Truth is, she's not sure she's enjoyed a meal more.

~ * ~

She wonders what kind of mystical power Rachel has over her dads because they don't ask her any questions about why she's sixteen and pregnant and staying with them rather than her own parents.

Instead, they sing along to Donna Summer while she helps Rachel clear the table and slow dance a little in front of the sink before David tackles the dishes and John dries, and it should make her feel really uncomfortable because they're both _men_ but it's mostly really nice to see two people in love without layers of lies between them.

What does make her uncomfortable is that she has to sleep with Rachel.

"I'm sorry," John says as he deposits extra towels on Rachel's nauseatingly pink bed. "We have a guest room, but we live in Western Ohio. It's not like it gets a lot of traffic."

"Except storing my old paintings," David pipes in and John nods apologetically.

"We'll clean it out tomorrow, but for tonight, you're gonna have to bunk with Rachel."

She pastes that bright, Fabray smile on her face and says thank you even though her heart starts racing because she's not just staying at Rachel Berry's any longer. She's staying _with _Rachel Berry, sleeping with Rachel Berry, and that's beyond too close for comfort. She used to draw pornographic pictures of the girl on the bathroom walls and make jokes about her getting sterilized – she rubs her belly and suppresses the laugh because the joke's on her – and now she's going to share her bed? It's too much, even for someone as weird as Rachel.

But Rachel never says a word of protest. She gives her a set of flannel pajamas (a Hanukkah present from her grandma and one size too big) and an extra toothbrush and makes a big production of washing up in the bathroom so she can have a few moments of privacy in the bedroom.

She pulls off her dress, a favorite from last summer and completely inappropriate for an Ohio winter, but she doesn't have anything else. She had thirty minutes to pack before her parents erased her from their lives the way she wants to erase the past four months. She assumes it's another one of god's tricks, because every time she shivers while waiting for someone to pick her up and cart her to a home that's not really hers, all she can think about is how deeply she's paying for her sins.

Her body is changing. Her arms are still thin and her butt is still its original size, but she's starting to look like someone stuck a basketball under the skin of her belly. It's starting to bulge, push against the elastic of her pajama bottoms, and she stares at herself in the mirror, wondering how so much could change in such a short amount of time. Four months. Less than half a year and nothing in her life remotely resembles what it used to.

"I guess it's just you and me kiddo," she says to her belly and pulls down Rachel's pajama shirt and takes a seat on Rachel's bed. When Rachel comes back from the bathroom she washes her face with Rachel's soap and brushes her teeth with a toothbrush Rachel gave her and dries her hands with Rachel's fathers' towel.

She stares at her reflection in the mirror, the familiar blonde hair and green eyes, and realizes they're the only things that still belong to her.

One hand rests on the rise of her belly, a pose she seems to be adopting all the time now, and her final words to Puck echo through her ears, _"I'm going to do this on my own. I know you don't understand it, but please respect it."_

Her baby is hers too, her one shot at doing things right. She's made so many mistakes, hurt so many people – she won't add this to her laundry list of sins.

~ * ~

Rachel has turned back the covers when she pads to bed and she's reading a book about someone named Fanny Brice, an eye mask pushed up on her forehead and her hair pulled in a high ponytail on top of her head.

It's awkward to say the least, to climb into bed with the girl she spent years torturing, and tried to steal her boyfriend over and over again, and told the truth and destroyed her world, but she has an obligation to her baby; there's nowhere else to go.

"Did you find everything okay?" Rachel asks.

"Of course. Thank you again," she says politely and pulls the covers up to her chin. She hopes the conversation will stop. They've done a good job of avoiding the elephant in the room with Rachel's dads around, but she doesn't know if she'll fare as well when they're alone, in the dark, with all that's happened between them weighing down the silence.

"You're welcome," Rachel says and turns the page. Quinn takes it as an opportunity to turn in for the night and rolls over and closes her eyes, but the silence is too loud and it permeates her mind and it's all she hears, the noise of all that's unsaid making it impossible to sleep.

"Okay, what's your angle, Rachel?" she finally says and it takes a moment but Rachel calmly marks her place and closes her book.

"What do you mean?"

She pushes up on her elbows and turns to face Rachel, all traces of sleep gone from her mind. Now she's annoyed, for the first time all day with Rachel, because the girl could tell the truth to Finn but lie to her?

"Why did you bring me here? What did you say to your dads so that they're welcoming me with open arms when they should be chasing me with a pitchfork or something for the way I've treated you all these years?"

Rachel finally looks at her and it's hard to take her serious with that ridiculous mask and ponytail, but her words are grave. "You're pregnant and alone, Quinn. I couldn't exactly toss you out on the street. I'm responsible for your situation. I couldn't walk away after all the damage I caused."

She just stares at her, because she knows Rachel was the one to tell Finn the truth and rip Glee club apart, but she was the one who was wrong all along. "I'm the one who lied," she says softly. "I lied to everyone, Rachel. I made Finn think I got pregnant in a hot tub. I made him get a job and give me money and break his mom's heart. I made him fall in love with a baby that's not his. And Puck…" she trails off. "I deserve to be alone, Rachel."

Rachel doesn't break their gaze but her hand finds Quinn's under the covers and twines her fingers with hers. "I know what it's like to be alone. You shouldn't have to go through that, especially now. I lied to my dads. We're not friends, at least not yet, but we can be. We've both done things wrong, but you need someone on your side, Quinn."

She's crying. She knows because her cheeks feel warm and wet and she's spent so much of the past four months doing it that it's almost second nature. "I don't deserve this."

Rachel doesn't let go of her hand, but she does squeeze it tight. "No, you don't. You've been horrible to me for years and I should hate you, but I don't. I've done things too, with Finn, that I'm rather ashamed of, and I need to make those things up to you. You're having a baby, Quinn. That's a fresh start. I thought we could it together."

"Your dads must think I'm such a slut," she says but Rachel doesn't laugh, just shakes her head solemnly.

"They think you made a mistake and it's terrible that your parents aren't supporting you. They want you here because I want you here." Rachel's face has always been an open book, and Quinn can read the longing there: for a friend, to belong, to make right the things she did wrong (even if they don't begin to compare to the crimes she committed). She's already hurt so many people; she can't say no to this.

"Okay," she says, because she's trying to be better but she can't completely shake her old self and she wants a friend too.

Rachel smiles for the first time since dinner and puts her book on the bedside table. "You can stay, Quinn, as long as you like."

She turns off the light and whispers a goodnight and Quinn curls on her side, knees tucked protectively over the bump of her baby.

A vision passes before her eyes, her belly getting bigger and her youth getting shorter, but laughter filling her world with every moment she spends in this house. It disappears, as quickly as it appeared, because she made a promise to herself after she ruined the lives of people who only wanted to love her. She's not dragging anyone else down with her. She's doing this alone.

She'll just stay here tonight even if she wishes she could stay forever.

~ * ~

She stays longer than one night.

She tells herself – during the car ride to school, lunch, Glee practice – that she'll find somewhere else to stay, but when the last rays of sun slip behind the trees she's at the drop off lane waiting for David to pick her up.

She still has nowhere to go. She skips first period and meets with Ms. Pillsbury, and her guidance counselor promises to make some calls but says it will take a couple days before she can find someplace permanent.

So after Glee, where she sings her heart out and practices her dance moves while everyone glares daggers into her back and Finn's absence is so obvious she can actually feel it in the room, she climbs into the backseat of David's BMW and listens to Rachel babble about Sectionals with her father while the cast recording of a Broadway show she doesn't recognizes hums in the background.

She retreats to her room before any of them can ask her questions and flops down on the bed. The guest room is decorated in plain shades of yellow, blue, and red, but it's quiet and it's hers and she doesn't complain. It wasn't so bad after all, sleeping with Rachel, but it made it impossible to escape. She needs a place to think without Rachel breathing down her neck, literally sometimes as much as figuratively.

She realizes how she's laying, like she's smothering her baby, and for a moment she worries that she knocked the placenta off the cord or something, and she hurriedly rolls onto her back. She can't feel her yet, but it's coming soon, and she needs to be prepared. She talked to Ms. Pillsbury about finding a place to live and a place to work but she knows she needs to do some of the legwork on her own. She's spent too much time relying on other people to build the house of cards housing her lies. Now that it's all tumbled down, she needs to create a future with her own two hands.

Thing is, she knows she has no real skills. Doing a forward tuck or singing on a stool are neat tricks, but not exactly transferable to gainful employment. She sighs and squeezes her eyes closed tight so she doesn't cry. She's spent too much time shedding tears over mistakes she could have avoided had she just been honest. Crying won't make anything better.

There's a knock on her door and she brushes furiously at her eyes and blinks a couple times to get rid of any stray tears. "Yeah, come in!" she says and pastes on that familiar Fabray smile. She thinks it's going to get a lot of face time over the next five months.

It's John and he pokes his head in and smiles in a way that reaches his eyes and makes her feel guilty and warm inside at the same time. "We're about to eat. You coming?"

She wants to say no, that they've done enough and she can make a plate later, but she likes how he's looking at her, like she's just a girl and not a pregnant sixteen-year-old who's been kicked out of her house and living with strangers, so she agrees. "Of course."

He's still wearing that smile, and so are David and Rachel, when she follows him into the kitchen.

The table is set and it looks like pot roast for dinner, but there's some kind of fluffy bread and a lot of wine and a pair of candle sticks like something out of a horror movie and she's really, really confused.

"I hope you didn't make all this for me," she says through the lump in her throat because it was enough to take her in and feed her, but it's too much to make some fancy dinner for her too.

It's when they shake their heads that she realizes they're wearing beanies and Rachel has a piece of lace pinned to her hair. "It's Shabbat," Rachel says and Quinn struggles to remember back to World History and thinks it's the Jewish holy day or something like that. "We're not the most observant Jews, but we always spend this night together as a family."

Quinn doesn't say much during this meal but she watches wide-eyed as Rachel closes her eyes and waves her hands and lights the candles, and her dads say blessings over the bread and the wine and all of it is lovely and beautiful and has nothing to do with begging forgiveness.

The religion part lasts about three minutes before the Berrys start digging into the food and she waits for the part where someone makes her feel bad for having thoughts or feelings or even acting on them once (just once, just that once), but it never comes. Instead, they laugh and joke and Rachel talks about her fears for Sectionals and she stays quiet again and eats the carrots and potatoes David keeps spooning onto her plate.

"So, Quinn," he breaks through her thoughts and she's off her game tonight, caught up listening to the Berrys talk about their days, and it takes her a moment to catch up. "Are you up for a party tonight?"

"Ugh, Dad," Rachel scoffs and she has to restrain herself from blinking again because it's the first time she's ever seen Rachel act like a normal teenager. "Don't do this to her."

"What?"

John and David exchange a look and Rachel rolls her eyes. "There's a Hanukkah party tonight at the JCC. It's a family tradition to go, but Rachel's being difficult this year."

"We'll be the oldest people there!" Rachel protests and actually pouts.

John and David are both waiting for her response and they have that look in their eyes, that one that says they only see a girl when they look at her and not a statistic, and she doesn't really want to go because she has no idea what Hanukkah is and they have Sectionals tomorrow, but she can't say no to these people any more than she could say no last night or this morning (when John put a home cooked breakfast on the table before her) or after school when David put on the Top 40 station so she could sing along to the music too, and she smiles, a real smile, and tells them yes.

Rachel looks like she wants to cry but Quinn's not sure she cares, even though it's too much like the old her, the one that would take pleasure in someone else's misery, even though she knows not to count her blessings because this isn't going to last.

~ * ~

The Hanukkah is less a party and more a trial by fire.

Rachel and her fathers are popular in the community, small as it is, and every eye in the room is fixed on her as she walks into the auditorium with her cross around her neck and one hand cradling the bump of her baby.

John and David act like it's totally normal to show up for a Jewish event with a pregnant, Christian teenager and tell anyone who asks that she's a friend of Rachel's who's staying with them for a couple weeks. After a few minutes, the whispering stops even if the stares follow her all night, and everyone turns back to the food.

She's not sure she's seen so much food in her life. There's piles upon piles of something fried that looks delicious but makes her want to throw up her dinner and jelly donuts and chocolate coins and some kind of soup that looks a lot like blood.

She follows her normal routine and stays away from the food table to sip her punch on the sidelines. Rachel stays with her at the beginning, but she knows most of the people and spends a lot of her time working the room. At one point, everyone starts dancing in a circle and crossing their feet and throwing their hands in the air and she's tempted to join in, because her time in Cheerios made her a good dancer and she knows she could pick up the moves, but she stays put. She's an outsider here, and not just because of the cross hanging like an albatross around her neck or the baby growing awkwardly under her baby doll dress, but because she's not one of them. She doesn't know these people, their religion or their traditions, and they don't know her. The Berrys are good people, too good for how they've taken her in, but she's not sure the rest of the community will respond in kind. She's ruined enough lives. She doesn't need to bring strangers into her mess.

Still, some of them are brave enough to cross that line.

She's watching a group of children play some kind of game with a top and M&Ms that seems a lot more like gambling and a lot less than a religious tradition to her, when a dark-haired woman wanders over with a plate of food.

There's something familiar about the set of her mouth and the shape of her nose, but Quinn can't place it even as the woman sits down beside her. "I thought you might be hungry," she says and pushes the plate towards Quinn. "Don't worry, I didn't get you anything fried."

Quinn is kind of hungry, even though she ate a ton at the Berrys, and the sugar cookies in the shapes of those tops do look good, but she's still enough of her mother's daughter not to accept gifts from strangers. "This is very sweet, but do I know you?"

The woman smiles and there's something familiar about her face that makes Quinn feel very sad. "I'm Amy Puckerman," she says. "Don't worry, I won't make you call me mom."

The smile falls from her face and suddenly she feels less sad and more guilty. So guilty it's actually hard to breathe, the way all the air seems to disappear from the room. "Wow," is all she can say but Amy's eyes don't narrow and her mouth doesn't twist into a sneer. She just keeps looking at her with warm, dark eyes that remind Quinn of her son's and pushes the plate closer.

"I know you're hungry. I was all the time when I was pregnant with Noah. Fried food made me want to puke my guts out most of the time, but I had one hell of a sweet tooth." She tilts her head and watches Quinn, the way she bites into a cookie and can't help the satisfied smile that appears on her face. "Thought so."

"Thank you," she manages to say and even though the cookie is really good it still feels wrong. "You didn't have to do this."

"No, I probably didn't. Noah told me everything last night. I can't say I agree with your decision, but I think I understand it. I love my son, but he's seventeen. His dad left when he was six and…" Amy trails off and Quinn sees something besides warmth in her eyes. She looks sad and tired and it makes it hard to breathe again from the pain Quinn realizes she's caused another person. "I know you think you need to do this on your own, but don't push him away forever. He isn't perfect, but he's a good boy and he loves this baby. He wants to help and you should let him."

"This shouldn't be his problem," Quinn says and she means it, even if just two days earlier she was clinging desperately to whichever boy seemed like the better provider. "I made the mistake."

Some of the sadness leaves Amy's eyes, and she still looks tired but she mostly looks determined. "He's not going to give up and neither am I. You're family now, Quinn, and family sticks together. What do you need? Clothes? Vitamins? I can't give much, but we're going to help."

She doesn't need clothes. David has already picked up her things from Finn's house and somehow conned his way into her parents' place to pick up her winter clothes, and she's mostly set for a couple months. Ms. Pillsbury has found her health coverage through Planned Parenthood and it's cheap enough that she thinks she can afford it with what's left of Finn's brief career as a waiter. But she does need money, because she might be living at the Berrys and they're generous beyond belief, but someone needs to pay for the clothes and the food and anything else she'll need.

"I need a job but I'm not sure I have any skills."

Puck's mom doesn't look convinced and she does this thing with her eyes that reminds Quinn so much of her son that she almost laughs out loud. "Well, you have to be good at something."

She shrugs. She can sing okay and dance better, but that's about it. "I have straight-As," she says.

A light goes off in Amy's eyes and she grabs Quinn's hand. "I've got it. How are you at history?"

"It's my best subject," Quinn says and waits for Amy to move her hand but she doesn't.

"We need a Sunday school teacher. It's just once a week and only pays a couple hundred dollars a month, but I think you'll do it well." She eyes the cross still dangling around Quinn's throat. "You know the Bible, right?"

Proverbs, 6:16, _"There are six things the lord hates….a heart that devises wicked schemes…"_ "Yeah," she says softly. "I know the Bible."

Amy still hasn't moved her hand and instead of pulling it away she squeezes Quinn's. "Anything else you need, you call me." She lets go of Quinn's hand to slide a piece of paper across the table. "I know you have Noah's number, but this is mine. Call any time, anything you need. I meant what I said, Quinn. The circumstances aren't ideal, but family is family. We'll be in touch about the job."

She squeezes Quinn's hand one more time before she leaves and even when she's on the other side of the room Quinn can still feel the imprint of her hand in her palm. She can feel tears pricking the backs of her eyes but this time she doesn't brush them away.

Two days ago she was all alone in the world and now she has people fighting to make her a part of their family.

~ * ~

They win Sectionals even when everything is stacked against them and when the bus pulls up in front of the school she climbs into the back of David's car without hesitating a second. It's home, whether she wants it to be or not.

She can feel their eyes on her, Puck's especially but also Finn's, standing off to the side while Rachel talks a mile a minute and gestures wildly with her hands.

She knows Rachel is defending her, defending her decision, and she doesn't want to look but can't help sneaking a peek. Finn is looking angrier by the second and Rachel kind of looks like she wants to cry, but she doesn't give up. Quinn looks away before she watches more people destroyed because of her lies.

Rachel is quiet when she climbs into the car and the trip home is filled with awkward silence. Dinner is the same, with John and David asking a million questions about Sectionals to keep the conversation going, but it's clear neither of their hearts are in it. When they both retire to bed almost immediately after, neither dad protests.

She gives Rachel her space and contemplates pretending the entire thing didn't happen, that Rachel wasn't thisclose to getting what she wanted and it wasn't her fault it fell apart, but she can't do that. She can't walk away, even when she wants to, from someone who's done so much for her.

Rachel's in bed when she knocks, but she isn't wearing her eye mask and there's soft music playing in the background. She looks tiny and exhausted and nothing like the Rachel she's come to know.

"I'm sorry," she says before Rachel can say a word. "I know it's all my fault. I'm working with Ms. Pillsbury to find another place to stay. I shouldn't be your problem for much longer."

Rachel shoots up in bed and her brows draw together and her jaw sets and apparently threatening to leave was all it took to make her look like herself. "You'll do no such thing. You're my friend too. I'm not choosing between you."

Quinn hates to say the words, because it still hurts to lose someone she loved even though she deserved to lose him, but she knows her time with Finn is over. Maybe some day they'll be friends, or he'll be able to look at her without so much pain and anger in his eyes that she feels like he's punched her without laying a finger on her, but they'll never be together again like they were before. She knows she loves him, not in love with him, but loves him all the same, and she wants him to be happy, but it doesn't make it any easier to see him happy with someone else. Especially someone who spent half their relationship trying to come between them. But Rachel is kind of her friend and most definitely her savior and she can't hold onto things that aren't hers anymore. "You've wanted Finn forever, Rachel. Don't let me get in the way."

"Finn isn't ready for anything right now, Quinn. He'll come around but he's going to need time to heal too. I'm going to be his friend but not if it means stopping being your friend to do it. I like having you here. I like having someone to fight over the bathroom mirror or the good chair at the dinner table. I don't have any siblings, but I have you."

Quinn has a sister, but she hasn't talked to her in over a month, not since the baby drama came out, and she and Morgan were always close before but it's like they don't even know each other now. She knows her parents are responsible for the break, but they're sisters; some things are supposed to be thicker than betrayal. Rachel is…Rachel is crazy but she's smart and she's loyal and she'll fight for her. She already has.

"I like having you too," she says and hesitates for a moment, but then remembers where she is, in this quirky house full of light and love, and bends down to wrap her arms around Rachel. It's not easy, with the bump of her belly and the position they're in, but she doesn't let go and Rachel doesn't either.

"This is weird," Rachel laughs as Quinn's belly presses hard against her side. "It's like another person snuck in there between us."

"Yeah, well, that's kind of what it is."

"What's it like, knowing you're going to be someone's mother?"

Quinn doesn't have an answer to that question. It's scary and exciting but mostly it's never going to happen. She might carry this baby to term, but she knows she can't take care of it. She reaches down to cradle her baby, the warm, heavy weight of it curled in the crook of her elbow. She loves it, her, the little girl held safe and secure inside her, and she thinks she might one day know her but never by the name mom. "I think I'm lucky to have gotten this far," she says and lets go of Rachel.

Suddenly, she's as exhausted as Rachel looks.

She says goodnight and Rachel looks like she wants to say more but holds her tongue. Quinn's grateful. It's not like Rachel to repress a thought, but if she's learned anything these past days it's that there's more to Rachel Berry than she ever imagined.

She climbs into her bed and the queen-size has never bothered her before but it feels enormous tonight. She closes her eyes and tries one side and then the other and when she rolls over for the third time she throws back the covers and pads to Rachel's room.

The eye mask is on and the room is dark and Rachel doesn't move but she does speak when the door opens with a light squeak. "I thought you'd be back."

"I just don't want to be alone tonight."

"You're always welcome here."

She pulls back the covers and climbs in and the bed is warm and the covers are soft and she knows even if the blankets were made of the scratchiest wool she wouldn't mind if it meant having someone by her side.

~ * ~

School continues as usual. The Glee kids give her a wide berth and Puck looks sad and Finn glares at her, but Rachel stands by her.

Things are tense between Rachel and Finn, and every day she waits at the drop off lane for Rachel to tell her to find another ride home but every day they just climb into David's car like it's what they've always done.

~ *~

Christmas morning arrives and the Ohio landscape is blanketed with two feet of snow and she sits in the picture window in the Berry's living room crying into a cup of cocoa.

She isn't even ashamed this time. She might be living in a house of Jews, but she's a Christian and this has always been a family day – _the_ family day – and she's spending it without the people who've worn that mantle for sixteen years.

She knows they betrayed her, abandoned her when she needed them most, but they're still her parents. She still loves them. She still wants them even if they don't want her.

There's a tap on her shoulder and she almost spills cocoa on David's Oriental rug, but catches herself in time. "Rachel, what do you want?"

She knows she's being mean but doesn't have the energy to correct herself. It's Christmas; even Rachel Berry should know to stay away. "I know this is a really difficult day for you, Quinn, but Christmas is a special day here too. We don't have your traditions but we have traditions of our own. We'd be honored if you'd join us." She blinks at Rachel for a long minute, tears caught in her eyelashes making it hard to see, but Rachel doesn't move, just watches her with a gentle smile on her face. "During times like these it helps to be with family."

John and David and their demon daughter are not family. She lives in their house and she eats their food and she'll let them buy her clothes, but she's not one of them. Yet, it's Christmas and she's alone. Her own family has abandoned her; it couldn't hurt to rent one for the day.

She wipes away the tears and puts her hand into Rachel's and follows her into the living room. John comes over and wraps an arm around her shoulder and guides her to the couch. "Quinn, I'm so glad you've chosen to join us. As a former goy myself it was a rough transition, but it's not so bad now. We don't have a tree, but we have food!"

Quinn can smell something in the background and she doesn't recognize it, but it smells delicious. "What are you making?"

"Matzo ball soup, knishes, kasha – all the good stuff your people are afraid of."

She blinks but it has nothing to do with tears. "You eat Jewish food on Christmas."

David shrugs and plops down in his recliner. "It's not like there's decent Chinese in Lima. We had to make our own traditions."

Rachel smiles as she sits on the couch. "I hope you're not offended, but we do things a little different in this house."

She clicks on the TV and John dims the lights. "What are we watching?" Quinn asks and all the Berrys look a little embarrassed.

"Fiddler on the Roof," Rachel says and turns her eyes to the screen. "It's also the story of suffering Jews."

Quinn's not sure if she's supposed to be offended or amused, but she chooses the latter and a big, huge belly laugh squeaks up through her throat and makes her shoulders shake. Around her, she's vaguely aware of the Berrys slapping high fives, until she hears David say, "See, I knew we could make her laugh," and it only makes her laugh harder, so hard that she cries, and it's then when she doesn't know if it's because the whole thing is funny or these people she barely knows care for her so much.

"Are we seriously watching that movie?" she asks when she finally gets it together.

"Yeah, we actually are," John says. "Although more because we just like it and less because we want to hate on your people."

She spent every previous Christmas in a pristine party dress watching her parents get smashed and their friends attempt not to puke all over her mother's leather sofa, and this morning she's sitting in her pajamas (actually Rachel's pajamas) and watching a movie about singing and dancing Jews.

It should hurt more than it actually does.

But the Berrys are laughing and singing along every word to "Tradition" and she recognizes the melody to "If I Were a Rich Man" from that Gwen Stefani song, and it's not like any Christmas she's experienced before but it's not so bad.

She laughs during "Matchmaker" and hums along to "Miracle of Miracles" and finds "Sabbath Prayer" so beautiful she actually pushes forward and rests her weight on her elbows to hear it better.

_"May the Lord protect and defend you_

_May he always shield you from shame..."_

She remembers her first Shabbat here, the strangeness of the religion but the warm feeling in her chest from the way they wrapped her in the arms of their family and held her tight, and it's still foreign but she thinks she's ready for the change.

She likes their family. She likes their god. She likes the way they won't give up on her even as she has so much to give back to everyone else.

She falls asleep midway through, before she can watch another father turn his back on his daughter for being someone other than what _he_ wants her to be, but Rachel nudges her awake a few minutes before the credits roll.

She watches Tevye and his girls march away from home, heads held high despite the sadness in their eyes, and her heart clutches in her chest as he passes Chava, the rebel, the one who broke his heart by being her own person.

"God be with you," he says and something breaks in her chest, tears dripping down her cheeks as John wraps an arm her shoulders and pulls her close to rest her cheek against his chest.

"Shhh," he says. "One day, you'll have that too."

She's not sure she believes him, because she knows her father and how deeply she's betrayed him, but she knows it will be okay.

She burrows deeper as David reaches over to stroke her hair and Rachel rubs her ankle and it stops mattering that one family has left her when another one is taking up permanent residence in her heart.

* * *

Writers live for feedback – please leave some if you have the time.


	2. Part II

**Title:** "Go Sadness"

**Author:** Lila

**Rating:** PG-13

**Character/Pairing:** Quinn (with special appearances from Amy and Ali Puckerman, Carole Hudson, and Rachel Berry)

**Spoiler:** "Sectionals"

**Length:** Part II of V

**Summary: **Quinn might think that she's going at it alone but there's always someone by her side

**Disclaimer:** Not mine, just borrowing them for a few paragraphs

**Author's Note:** As with many of my fics, this one has expanded because I am not a succint writer. So the fic is now five parts as opposed to three. Thank you to all for the wonderful support for this fic. I have a very clear idea of how it's going to play out and where it's going to go, and I'm so happy you're enjoying the journey Quinn is undertaking. Without further ado, enjoy!

* * *

**Part II: _Mothers and Daughters_**

---

She spends New Year's Eve in her pajamas (Rachel's pajamas), on Rachel's couch, drinking sparkling cider and watching the ball drop with Rachel's dads.

It's starting to become a habit; it's scary how natural it feels.

A year ago, she spent NYE kissing Peter Graham in Santana's living room while confetti fell from the rafters and Dave Karofsky spilled a beer down her arm.

It was before Finn and before Puck and before Glee and before Rachel Berry and it seems so far away that it's almost like it was another life.

Truth is, it _was_ another life.

She rests one hand over the bump of her baby and the other clutches Rachel's as the countdown starts and her dads jump around like maniacs.

"Five, Four, Three, Two, One," they scream in unison and then start making out like two teenagers and she and Rachel both avert their eyes (and she swears she hears a gagging sound coming from Rachel's direction).

She screws her eyes shut, so tight lights flash against her eyelids like the ball descending into Time's Square, and she makes a wish. She wishes that 2010 will be better; she wishes to do things right.

She always kissed a boy at midnight and hoped to kiss Finn the night the 2000s reached an end.

She's a little sad that she's welcoming in the new year and she's alone.

Rachel's dads finally pull apart and drag Rachel to her feet and grab her wrists too so they're standing in a little huddle of Berrys, whispering "Happy New Year" to each other and squeezing tight.

It takes a moment but she joins in.

The past month has been all about new traditions; she stores this one deep in her heart with all the others.

---

She spends most of break sleeping and catching up on schoolwork and avoiding humanity.

Rachel sees a movie with Mercedes and Tina and invites her along but she declines the invitation.

It's quiet at the Berry's house, even when Rachel's home, and it's the only place she can think. It's the only place she can hear her own thoughts without the noise of her betrayal, her lies, her mistakes filling all the available space.

Glee was awkward those final weeks, with everyone attempting to play Switzerland between Team Finn and Team Quinn and failing miserably. They stood by her, at least in name, because they're New Directions and it's what they do, but she knows where their sympathies, their _loyalties_ lie. She knows they're not with her.

So she likes hiding out because this house is the one place she knows it won't ever matter who she was in the past. All they see is the person she's working to becoming in the present.

---

Amy Puckerman comes through and she starts the new year with a group of middle schoolers who spend more time staring at her belly than paying attention to her lesson.

She's wearing jeans and a long sweater that hides how her pants won't button or zip all the way anymore, and even though she does a good job of hiding her bump it's still there pushing against the fine wool.

She crosses her arms under her breasts and stares them down, the curled ends of her ponytail swinging gently over the back of her neck.

They fold, just like all the others before them, and actually listen to what she has to say.

Amy gave her free reign to teach what she wants but she still does her research and prepares an overview of the week's Haftorah portion, even if she had to ask Rachel three times how to spell the word to get her google search just right.

Rachel had peered over her shoulder, forehead knotting at the links that pop up onscreen. "I don't think you have to go this in depth, Quinn," she'd pointed out and Quinn bit her bottom lip to hold back the retort on the tip of her tongue. She's grateful to Rachel, she really is, but she doesn't need the girl literally breathing down her neck all the time.

"Anyone can teach the Bible," she'd said. "I want to make these kids think."

Rachel had squeezed her shoulder and disappeared into the family room. "Good luck."

She clicks on the first link that looks acceptable and her eyes blur from the fancy language and tiny font, but she props her chin in her palm and keeps reading. These people have given her a chance, an opportunity to make amends; she's not going to let them down by doing it half ass.

The portion tells the story of David, the great king, and his son Solomon, the greatest king, and the legacy passed between them.

Her eyes are open wide as David tells his son the story of his life, the mistakes he made and the wrongs done unto him, and the lessons of his past his son will carry with him in the future.

When she finishes reading there are tears in her eyes and both arms are wrapped tight around her baby. She knows she won't keep her – _can't_ keep her – but she still thinks sometimes, what will her daughter take from her? Will she have blonde hair and green eyes? Will she sing? Will she cheer? Will she make the right choices?

She wonders if she has to be there for the sins of the mother to pass to her daughter.

She closes her eyes and blinks rapidly, like always, to push the tears away. She won't – _can't_ – let herself wonder about these things.

She made a decision: the greatest gift she can give her daughter is anyone but herself as her mother.

---

The lesson goes fine.

She has the kids read aloud and they answer questions after and they don't look thrilled to be trapped in religious school on their weekend, but don't throw spitballs at her either.

She decides to call it a draw.

The parents say little as she stands at the drop off lane in front of the JCC but they're kind enough to keep their eyes on her face rather than the bulging waistline of the new parka the Berrys bought her for Christmas.

She smiles politely and waits for the familiar purr of David's BMV to pull up beside her.

She hears a noise, a soft pitter-patter of feet, and she turns slowly because she did her part and even enjoyed it some, but has little desire to engage in small talk with one of her student's parents. She just wants to go home, disappear under the covers in her bedroom, and hide away from the world. School starts in under twenty-four hours; she's looking forward to going back less than a drug-free labor.

"Hi!" a voice says and it's bright and cheerful and almost chirpy and clearly belongs to someone under the age of thirteen, but she doesn't recognize it. The voice comes with a skinny, dark-haired girl and there's something vaguely familiar about her but Quinn can't quite place it.

"Hi," she says and takes a step back. Even if this girl is one of her students, although there were only ten of them and she doesn't think this girl is one of them, she's really not in the mood for conversation.

"You're Quinn, right?" the girl asks and she feels the reluctant smile fall from her face because this girl was definitely not her student and otherwise there's only one way she'd know who she is.

"You're Puck's sister," she says wearily and prays, for the first time since her father booted her out of his life, because all she wants in life right now is for David's car to pull up and take her away from this waking nightmare.

The girl takes a step closer, nodding all along. "Except I call him Noah. That's his name, you know." There's something vaguely hostile in her tone, almost threatening, and Quinn might actually be unsettled if the entire thing weren't kind of funny. And sweet. And not unlike Puck himself. She won't – _can't_ – think about that so she turns her attention to his sister instead.

"I'm Quinn."

The girl nods, because it's a fact she already knows. "I'm Ali."

Quinn's not exactly sure how to react, because this girl is a stranger and family all at the same time, but she's still a Fabray when it matters so she sticks out one gloved hand. "Nice to meet you."

Ali's hand is tiny and frail, but her handshake is strong and she looks directly into her eyes when their hands lock. It's so much like staring into Puck's eyes, dark and long-lashed and filled with promises, that she has to look away even though she knows it's rude.

"So," Ali says, just as a battered minivan that definitely doesn't belong to David Berry but she's willing to bet her life is owned by Amy Puckerman pulls into the drop off lane. "Does this mean we're going to be sisters?"

She's saved by Amy once again, as the sliding door opens and she leans back in her seat to assess the two girls shivering in the Ohio wind. "I already talked to David," she says as Quinn follows Ali into the backseat and buckles her seatbelt under both their watchful eyes. "You're coming to lunch at our house."

She contemplates getting angry with Amy, because if she knows anything, she knows how much it hurts when people make choices for someone else, but she also knows better than to fight. She's still sixteen and pregnant and (barely) not homeless. This isn't the time to rock the boat.

---

The Puckerman house is small and a bit ramshackle on the outside, but the inside is neat and clean, even if the woven rugs are nearly threadbare in spots and the couch has clearly seen better days.

"Sorry about the mess," Amy apologizes when a wet leaf lands on her cheek as they walk through the front door. "Noah is supposed to clean the gutters, but he's been busy these days." She shoots Quinn a veiled look, somewhere between pity and anger and regret, and sighs heavily, smiles to make things right. "But you know how that goes."

Quinn doesn't say anything in response, because this woman is bossing her around and kind of insulting her, but she's also feeding her and found her a job and she's not exactly wrong about Puck.

She keeps her eyes wide open, so she doesn't have to see the raw pain in his when she pushed him away for the last time.

"Is he home?" she asks, partly to change the subject and mostly because if they keep talking about Amy's son and how much she hurt him, she'll slide down the wall in a crying mess and she's not going to be that person. She's Quinn Fabray; she keeps her breakdowns to the confined space of her guest bedroom.

"He's working," Amy says as she takes Quinn's coat and hangs it in the closet and can't quite keep her eyes from the slight bump under the thick wool of her sweater.

Quinn feels that familiar stab of anger in her chest, because she knows Puck and she knows what "work" means to him, and she pastes on her Fabray smile before something mean and cutting comes out of her mouth. "It's probably for the best. Things have been awkward between us."

Amy opens her mouth and closes it again, sucks in a breath. "You can't push him away forever, Quinn. I won't let you."

Amy's dark eyes are fierce and her tone is vaguely threatening and Quinn knows she won't physically hurt her, but she's still never been so happy to see a bratty tween as when Ali bounces into the hallway and announces that lunch is ready.

---

The food is simple, grilled cheese and tomato soup, and Ali does most of the talking. Quinn learns about Miley Cyrus and boy named Matt Graham she thinks is related to the boy she kissed last New Year's Eve and her cheeks hurt from the effort to keep the smile pinned to her face because she's so jealous of Ali that it almost hurts.

She's supposed to have this life, four years older and wiser. She's supposed to spend her time worrying about a date for prom or laughing at the sun worshipping gone wrong that Brittany brought back from the islands or fighting for front row seats the night "Eclipse" opens.

She slips a hand from the table to cradle the bump of her baby._ This_ isn't supposed to be her life. She's Quinn Fabray – her world isn't supposed to end this way.

---

Amy insists on washing the dishes alone and Quinn retreats into the family room with Ali. The couch is worn but comfortable, a bit too comfortable, and she worries about future lunches at this house because she's not sure she'll be able to get up and off the couch on her own for much longer.

"So what are you going to name it?" Ali asks after a few minutes of awkward silence.

Quinn sucks in a breath, pushes back the nasty comment, and forces another smile. "She's twelve. Ali is only twelve," she tells herself. "She doesn't know any better," but there's something too innocent in those dark eyes and she remembers how she got into this mess in the first place: when she looked into Ali's brother's deep, dark eyes and all rational thought slipped from her mind.

"I haven't really thought about it," she manages to say because this isn't a conversation she's willing to have. Even Rachel knows better than to bring this up and Ali might have that Puckerman cunning, but Quinn knows she doesn't understand how harshly she's rubbing salt into an open wound.

"Have you asked Noah?" she presses on and this time Quinn can't hide the way her breathing stops and it feels like her chest is closing in around her lungs.

"Ali," she says when she regains her ability to talk, when things like baby names have been locked away safely in the back of her mind in a filing cabinet labeled **Things I Can Never Have**. "I know you're only trying to help, but this is really none of your business."

"I know I'm young," Ali says and her chin tilts up, that too familiar dark fire burning in her eyes. "And honestly, I'm still not totally sure where babies come from, but I know you're having one with my brother." This time, Ali pauses, and pain fills the stretched silence. "We don't have a dad," she says softly. "Noah knew him, but he left when I was a baby. So I don't really know what dads do, except work a lot and listen to weird music and take us to McDonald's after soccer practice. Noah does that for me. I know he can do that for your baby too."

Ali looks like she wants to cry and Quinn feels that way too, because the die has been cast. Puck isn't perfect, she knows that better than most, but he deserves more than bearing the brunt of her lies. One day, she knows he'll thank her for this, but she's not dragging him down with her; she's not ruining his life the way she's already ruined hers.

"It's not that simple," Quinn manages to say, because she _wants_ to have this conversation. It's what she always wanted, since she was a little girl and her mother slipped her first doll into her arms, because she's always wanted to be a mother. She just never wanted to be a mother like this – _can't_ – be a mother like this.

Ali sighs wearily, like she's heard this explanation before, and turns back to the television. "Just thought you'd want to know."

They don't discuss it more and spend most of the afternoon watching old "Degrassi" episodes and giggling over the ludicrous plots. It's more fun than Quinn's had in a long time, since Christmas day at the Berrys, and she's surprised by how much she enjoys herself. It's easy with Ali, pretending everything will be wrapped up with a pretty bow at the end of the half hour, and the jealousy of before eases into calm acceptance. She can't change her lot in life but she can want more for this little girl. Her hand stills on the bump of her baby; she's determined to give it all to her little girl.

They don't talk about it but the conversation stays with Quinn for the rest of the afternoon. Especially when she climbs into the front seat of the mini-van so Amy can drive her home.

She doesn't say much during that trip either, other than a few comments about the weather and the food, but when Amy pulls to a stop in the Berry's driveway Quinn doesn't think she's going to let her off so easy.

"Thank you for coming," Amy says as Quinn's hand closes on the door handle and her words are simple, but Quinn knows there's deeper meaning behind them. There always is when it involves a Puckerman.

She pauses and grips the handle so tight her knuckles turn white. It's starting to be familiar, the way she holds onto any inanimate object in sight in order to keep it together. "You can stop being nice to me," she says softly because it's true. Rachel has taken her under her wing because she doesn't know any better, and her dads keep her because they love their daughter. Amy Puckerman is smarter than all of them combined. She should know when to give up.

Yet, she surprises her, like her son always has. "Quinn, I didn't invite you to lunch for my health. Or your health. I asked you over because I want to get to know you. Ali does too. I hope you'll come next week."

"Okay," she hears herself say before she can think the words all the way through. She should know better than to agree. She only hurts the people she cares about; it's only a matter of time before the Puckermans push her away the way her parents did. She won't even let herself think about the moment the Berrys' blindfolds are finally ripped off and they see her for what she truly is.

Amy smiles and Quinn's grip eases on the door handle. "Great. See you next week."

---

She has lunch with Amy and Ali the following week, and the one after that, and sometimes she helps with the dishes and sometimes she watches TV in the family room, but she enjoys herself every time. The Puckermans are different than the Berrys, harder yet more brittle, but she likes the way they look at her, like they don't hate her even though they have every reason to.

Puck is never there.

She sees him at school and especially at Glee, but he doesn't talk to her and barely looks at her and every time she walks through the doorway of his house she feels all the more guilty when his sister's face lights up at the sight of her.

One day, she hopes he'll be able to look at her the same way.

---

She keeps working too and the paychecks start coming. It's not a lot, but it's enough for what she needs to do.

She borrows David's car one Wednesday after Glee and pulls to a stop in front of the Hudson's house. Finn is getting a slushie with Mike and Matt, but she knows his mom has the evening off and the last vestiges of light are just slipping behind the trees as she takes a deep breath, releases her fingers from the vise grip they have on the door handle, and takes a step into the cold.

She's lived in Ohio her entire life but it still almost knocks her off her feet, the way the wind slips through the down of her parka and coats her insides in ice. If it weren't so frigid, she thinks she'd laugh at the irony, because just four and a half months ago people used to make jokes about how her veins were clogged with ice and now it's halfway to the truth.

Four and a half months ago one icy glare from beneath an arched eyebrow would have sent lesser beings scurrying away in fear, and today she's freezing almost to death on the porch of her ex-boyfriend's house. Four and a half months ago she convinced him they conceived a baby in a hot tub; today she can't lift her hand to knock on his door and liberate herself from her personal rendition of "To Build a Fire."

She takes a deep breath, watches it freeze in the still air, and takes another to find her courage. She's Quinn Fabray. She blackmailed Sue Sylvester into submission and rendered her speechless more than once. She can do this too.

She takes another breath and rattles her knuckles against the door. It's softer than she intended, stifled down under three layers of mittens and gloves, so she rings the bell like she should have done in the first place and shivers until the door opens.

Finn's mom is wearing a robe and her hair is a mess and the house itself isn't much better, but the hall light is warm and bright and it looks like a home; that icy feeling takes root in her chest again but this time she knows it has nothing to do with the cold outside.

"Hi Carole," she says and sounds guilty and knows she looks guiltier, but doesn't bother hiding how she feels. She lost that right the day the truth came out and she ripped her son's world apart again.

"Quinn!" Carole says and she doesn't smile but she doesn't glare either. She mostly looks shocked. "What are you doing here?"

It takes effort, with the layers of mittens and parka in her way, but she manages to pull an envelope from the pocket of her coat. "I wanted to give you this," she says and pushes the envelope in Carole's direction. "I didn't deserve it, we know that now, but you took me into your home and I want to repay you. It's not much, but I hope you'll take it." There's a pleading note at the end that makes her want to cringe, because she's Quinn Fabray and she's not one for begging, but she pulled the worst lie in her bag of tricks on this woman. She doesn't have the right to save face any longer.

Carole just stares at the envelope and it's hard to read her expression under the rat's nest of hair, but Quinn can hear her sigh loud and clear in the painfully silent air. "Come inside, honey," is all she says and holds the door open wide.

It's not the reaction she expected, but she also didn't expect Rachel Berry to adopt her or Puck's mom to support her, and she's getting so used to strangers taking her in that she steps through the open door without a second thought.

It's weird being inside the house again, without Finn carrying her bag and worrying about the baby and his mother aging another ten years in front of their eyes, and her steps falter as she follows Carole into the kitchen because she might be used to people coming to her aid, but she's not sure she'll ever be used to the guilt closing in on her heart.

"Take a seat," Carole says and deposits a plate of cookies on the kitchen table. She even goes so far as to pour a glass of milk before sitting opposite Quinn. "Come on, try one. They're homemade and I know you must be hungry."

She is hungry, she's hungry all the time, but she can't bring herself to eat in this house. She knows how tight the Hudson budget is stretched; her heart hurts from thinking how much deeper in the hole she put them. "Why are you doing this?" she asks instead, the untouched plate of cookies hovering at the edge of her vision.

Carole looks at her, long and hard, but there's nothing mean in her eyes. "I didn't know Amy when she was pregnant with Noah, but I was there for her with Ali. She craved sweets all the time."

Quinn forces a smile, but it's flimsy and a fight to keep it from turning down at the corners. It's not the Fabray smile. "Why are you being nice to me? You should hate me for what I did."

Carole keeps looking at her but her eyes don't turn, even when Quinn brings to light what they've both been avoiding. "I know I should hate you, honey, but I can't. What you did was wrong, there's no denying that, but you're sixteen. That's something."

She can't believe this woman is defending her, this woman whose son she destroyed and whose money she stole; she doesn't deserve this kind of support. "I don't understand."

Carole reaches across the table to rest her hand on hers. "I don't know your family well, Quinn, but I never thought I'd see the day when a mother and father could disown their own child. I might not be a perfect mom, but Finn has me. He'll always have me. I can't hate someone who doesn't have that."

She's been trying to hold it in but it's too much, the cookies and the sentiment and exactly what she needs but can't have sitting across the battered table, and she bursts into tears before she can help herself. She buries her face in her hands and her shoulders shake and then shake more, so much she thinks her heart might stop beating, when Carole pulls her against her chest and wraps her arms around her tight. "It's going to be okay, honey. It's going to be okay."

She wants to push Carole away, because it's too much and too ridiculous, the one person she wronged as much as Finn comforting her in a time of need, but she can't seem to shrug out of her embrace. She really appreciates David and John, but she misses her mom. She misses the softness of her skin and the scent of her perfume and the tinkle of her laugh, and Carole Hudson reminds her a bit too much of a (more) terribly dressed Rachel Berry but she'll do in a pinch. She smells wrong and her hands are kind of scratchy, but her voice is soft and soothing and Quinn closes her eyes and lets go.

---

She leaves the Hudson house with the plate of cookies but no further promises. They teeter on the passenger side seat, on the verge of a fall after every turn, and she keeps one hand balanced on the plate and one on the wheel. She knows it's silly, because they're just cookies and she's pregnant and driving, but she can't seem to let them go.

She's only a couple blocks from the Berry's house when she drives through a yellow light just as it turns red, and her she reluctantly lets go of the cookies to press her fingers to her lips and then the rearview mirror and then make a wish.

In four and a half months, she's going to have a baby and her daughter is going to need a mother.

She prays, for the second time since the truth came out, that it's someone better than herself.

---

The next afternoon she comes home from Glee, laughing with Rachel over the lyrics to "Avenue Q" (the more she lives with these people, the more she listens to show tunes), when John greets them at the door with a face more serious than she's ever seen before.

"Quinn," he says softly and David freezes in the garage door, Rachel almost bumping into him from behind. "There's someone here to see you."

His eyes aren't sad, just concerned and worried, but she pastes on her best smile, the Fabray smile she's had so much time practicing these past days, and tells him it's okay. "It's just my mother, John," she says, because she knows there's no one else it could be, waiting for her in the living room no one ever goes inside. "She already let my dad throw me out. What more can she do?"

David looks like he wants to say something, but John shakes his head, just a tiny movement of his head, but enough to keep David from talking. "Okay," he says and retreats into the kitchen. "You know where to find us if you need us." Rachel tries to stay but David drags her arm and pulls her towards the kitchen while she protests furiously behind him. "She's still her mom, Ray," Quinn hears him say. "She needs to work this out."

She waits a beat, smoothes the skirt of her baby doll dress (wool, not cotton, another gift from the Berrys), and slowly proceeds to the living room. She hasn't been there since Christmas, when Rachel found her crying into her hot cocoa and made a terrible day an afternoon to remember, and nothing about the room has changed except the Fabray occupying its space.

Her mother is perched delicately on the edge of the Berry's sofa, her hair pinned up off her face and her eyes darting nervously from photograph to knick knack to the Picasso print over the piano.

"Hi Mom," she says when she works up the nerve, a good minute or two after she tip-toes into the doorway, and her mother's head shoots up so fast her hair almost slips from its updo. Her eyes round, because she's bigger than the night she was evicted from the only home she'd ever known, and her belly is wide and round under the empire-waist of her dress. She rests one forearm protectively over her bump, as if to shield her daughter the way her mother didn't shield her.

"Oh, Quinnie," her mother sighs and gazes at her with tear-filled eyes. "What's happened to you?"

Her mother hasn't yelled yet or passed judgment, so Quinn forces herself to keep that smile on her face as she sits on the opposite sofa. "I'm five months along, Mom," she points out.

Her mother nods. "I remember. So you're well?"

The air feels heavy, and not just because people only walk in the living room three times a year. Her mother was supposed to stand by her through anything, to stand by her through thick and thin. Instead, they're sitting on borrowed furniture in a borrowed house and trying to pretend they have anything to say to one another.

"My baby is healthy. My doctor says I'll be able to feel her kick soon." She sticks to sterile facts and figures, because she knows if she opens up, if she admits how hard this has been and the weight of the guilt boring down on her shoulders, she'll breakdown completely. This woman might be her mother, but she knows she's not on her side. She's Quinn Fabray; she's too smart to yield any ground.

"Quinn, what are you doing here?" her mother hisses under her breath. "I went by the Hudson's last week to drop off some money, and Carole told me that you're living here." Her mother looks left and looks right and Quinn might have responded to her statement about the money if not for the next sentence to leave her mouth. "Quinn, they're Jews! And one of them is black! What were you thinking?"

She shouldn't be surprised, because four and a half months ago she might have thought the same thing, but she still has to temper down the bite in her retort. "They're good people," she says softly. "They took me in when I had no one else would." She pauses, stares her mother right in the eye, and feels her smile leave her face. There's no reason to pretend anymore.

Her mother's eyes soften in ways she's never seen them before, because her mother drove herself here and Quinn knows that for once it's not booze talking. "Quinn, I love you…" She trails off and sucks in a deep breath, looks away while she wipes at her eyes.

Quinn feels her face fall, tears springing to her eyes, and she's no longer tempted to wipe them away. This is the end of the road. She's never been good at begging, but this is her mother. She tightens the arms cradling her baby. How could she ever say no?

She lets go of everything she's held onto these past weeks and tears start leaking from her eyes as she gives up what's left of her pride. She begs. "Please, Mom, can I come home?"

"Baby, you know I can't do that. Your father…he's not ready to see you yet."

She manages a nod, a struggle when she's focusing every muscle in her body on keeping her shoulders from shaking and tears from streaming down her cheeks. "What do I have to do to make you want me again?"

Her mother says nothing but her eyes remain pinned to her belly. Her silence says it all.

---

She skips dinner but Rachel insists on bringing a plate upstairs.

There's a knock on her door and she tells the person on the other side to go away, because for once she's not hungry and her heart feels bruised and she's not sure she'll ever stop crying.

Yet, if the Fabrays and Berrys have anything in common, it's that they're both stubborn and Rachel pushes the door open anyway and sits on the edge of the bed.

"Rachel, I'm trying really hard to be nice, but I don't have the energy anymore. Please go away before I punch you in the face."

Rachel laughs, and it's so light and airy that it almost makes Quinn smile. It doesn't, but for half a second, she does forget how much she hates her life. "I've heard it before, Quinn. We both know you're all bark and no bite."

This time Quinn does smile, because it's true, at least at this point in her life. With all the judgment directed her way, she hasn't had the energy to cast stones at anyone else. "I don't want to talk about it," she says. She mostly wants to forget it ever happened. Her mother's face keeps coming to mind, the tears in her eyes and the regret straining the corners of her mouth, but how she walked out of the Berry's house without the only thing she came for. She draws her knees to her chest and holds her baby tight between them. She's going to keep her safe for the time she has left.

"Do you ever think about your mother?" she changes the subject, because she knows what it's like to be abandoned, but she wants to know what it's like to be given away.

"All the time," Rachel says. "My Dad might be an artist and Daddy can sing okay, but neither of them gave me my voice. That had to come from her."

It comes to mind again, the things she'll give her daughter: blonde hair and green eyes and a legacy of betrayal and lies. She shivers, even though she's laying under two down comforters, and feels the mattress shift as Rachel curls up behind her.

"I know my voice came from my mom," Rachel says. "But my talent? That came from my dads. They're the ones who pushed me and supported me. Where I am today? I wasn't born with that."

"I don't have anything to give her," Quinn whispers. "I lie, I hurt people, I hurt you…what kind of mother does that make me?"

Rachel reaches across the space between them and rests a hand on her back, her wrist moving in comforting circles that ease away the ache. "You're strong, Quinn. You fight for what you believe in and you don't give up. I'm the same way, so it's a quality I can admire and respect about you." Anyone else, and those words would have been said with a hint of teasing and self awareness, but this is Rachel Berry so Quinn knows she means those words to her soul but it doesn't make them any less true. She is a fighter, whether it's taking down Glee or saving Glee or keeping up her lies, and on the rare occasion she's lost it hasn't been without trying.

"I don't know if it's enough," she says. It's always weighing on her mind, nature and nurture, and if her daughter will ever escape the sins she committed in her own life.

Rachel's hand stills on her back, but her words pack all the necessary punch. "You're not you mother, Quinn. Don't let her make you feel bad because she wasn't strong enough to make the right choice."

Rachel squeezes her shoulder once before climbing out of her bed and padding to her own room, but Quinn stays awake with Rachel's words bouncing around her head like a ping pong ball.

She doesn't know what choice she'll make in four and a half months time, but she knows what kind of person she needs to be in order to make it the right one.

No matter what happens, she can't –_ won't_ – be her mother.

* * *

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